UK local elections: how London turned from blue to red

Even the wealthiest enclaves of the capital turned against the Tories last week. What has made the city a Labour redoubt - and is its dominance more of a menace than a boon?

The most expensive property on the Monopoly board is Mayfair, which also happens to be the most exclusive expanse of real estate in real-life London. Flush with private equity firms, eye-wateringly expensive restaurants and luxury car showrooms, it voted Labour in last week's local elections and helped swing Westminster council away from the Tories for the first time since the Beatles were in the charts with Can't Buy Me Love.

Recent years have seen working-class strongholds in the north of England turning Tory, and now you have the even odder spectacle of the super-rich in London voting Labour. That says something about Labour's success in the capital but it also suggests that there is a growing divide between London and the rest of the country, where the party's performance was decidedly less impressive.